


Identity

by Maiden_of_the_Moon



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Drama, M/M, Romance, reeducation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-26
Updated: 2013-10-26
Packaged: 2017-12-30 13:22:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1019108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maiden_of_the_Moon/pseuds/Maiden_of_the_Moon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not the first time Cecil asks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Identity

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Nope.
> 
> Author's Note: Written and edited at 1 am, because Nazi-Nurse and her followers like to fill me with glorious inspiration at incredibly inopportune times. Please forgive me for... Um, well, the whole of this.
> 
> PS. Please come Huddle with Us on [tumblr](http://singacrossthemoon.tumblr.com/)!

"Who are you?" asks a voice like ichor: slick as oil and black as night. It clogs his ears and pores and lungs like so much spilt petroleum; Earl flushes an asphyxiated scarlet, worried that this spark of attraction will set his doused body alight.

"Who are you?" His bewildered date frowns, squinting at the paper cards before him in a valiant attempt to make sense of the game that they're playing. Trying to play. Something about catching a murder, solving a crime. It'd be easier to concentrate if the Secret Police would stop muttering side comments and making quips about incompetence. Earl laughs-- not for the first time-- as Cecil-- also not for the first time-- throws his hand into the muggy air, swearing creatively as the static-riddled voice coming from behind the bookshelf solves the puzzle before he does. Again.

"Who are you?" his boyfriend growls, cowering beneath a blanket in the furthest corner of the closet. Earl has lived in this town long enough to know better than to ask; any horror terrible enough to reduce Cecil to such a state is far more than his lesser mind can handle. So instead, he coos. And comforts. And cuddles Cecil back to the present, kissing his nose and ears and the tender tips of his thin fingers. The past is gone, and cannot harm them any longer.

"Who are you?" Cecil gasps, thoroughly impressed. He looks his lover up and down and up once more, as if unable to recognize the man beneath the honorable weight of a scout master's garb. Earl, blushing the same cursed red as the badges on his chest, returns the favor: falls again into admiring the dichotomy of the mystery before him. The wide whites of pearlescent eyes, matched to a voice as deep as forbidden seas. Pale skin and onyx markings; pallid teeth in a mouth like the Void. Yin and yang and ouroboros monochrome, looping in infinities like the ring on Cecil's left hand.

"Who are you?" the radio host demands, lip curling in trepidation as he takes a small step back. His brow has knotted, his features have pinched; the honey of his voice has turned, soured, and gone rancid like old meat. The panic that Earl has been suffering all week, the bowel-clenching anxiety of Cecil's sudden absence, drains from his body in an abrupt, cancerous catharsis. Everything drains. Emotions, strength, the will to carry on. It all slips away like memories, like Cecil's fingers from his own. And Earl lets him go. 

Earl lets him go.


End file.
